Thermal and solutal conditions at the tips of a directional dendritic growth front

The line-of-sight averaged, time-dependent dendrite tip concentrations for the diffusion dominated vertical directional solidification of a metal model (ammonium chloride and water) were obtained by extrapolating exponentially fit diffusion layer profiles measured using a laser interferometer. The tip concentrations were shown to increase linearly with time throughout the diffusion dominated growth process for an initially stagnant dendritic array. The process was terminated for the cases chosen by convective breakdown suffered when the conditionally stable diffusion layer exceeded the critical Rayleigh criteria. The transient tip concentrations were determined to significantly exceed the values predicted for steady state, thus producing much larger constitutional undercoolings. This has ramifications for growth speeds, arm spacings and the dendritic structure itself.